Most Clinton campaign donors are women, but super PACs still dominated by men

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton‘s presidential campaign received contributions from more women than men in 2015, a breakdown unique among the presidential candidates so far this cycle.

The gap isn’t huge, but it’s real: Clinton received contributions from more than 25,000 women who gave more than $200 in 2015. The combined $37.6 million they gave outpaces by about $200,000 the campaign’s haul from the 22,100 men who donated to Clinton.

No other candidate came close to matching Clinton’s female donor share of 53 percent. Every other campaign’s donor base was more than 60 percent male.

Other than Clinton, retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson received the most contributions from women, who gave 37 percent of all the money he raised. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) was right on his heels at 36 percent.

(Only donations of greater than $200 must be “itemized” on FEC reports, meaning the donors’ identities must be disclosed. It’s impossible to know what share of any candidate’s smaller donors are male or female.)

Within the Clinton, Sanders and Carson campaigns, the percentage of women donors and the percentage of money that came from women — how many women donors there were versus how much money they gave — were generally the same. That makes sense: both women and men are subject to the $2,700 contribution limit on donations directly to the campaign.

However, when super PACs like the Clinton-backing Priorities USA Action and Correct the Record enter the equation, the appearance of gender equity among Clinton’s donors nearly disappears. With no individual contribution limits, these groups raised far more from men. Though women made up 54 percent of all donors to super PACs supporting the former secretary of state, they contributed just 27 percent of all funds raised by the groups. For every dollar men gave to the pro-Clinton super PACs, women gave 33 cents.

It’s not the first time Clinton’s politics have been roughly reflected in her campaign but not the super PACs supporting her. In a December debate, Clinton claimed she received more money from students and teachers than people on Wall Street. (She implored viewers to check that on OpenSecrets.org; we did.) But Clinton left out that 17 percent of the unlimited contributions raised by her super PACs had come from the securities and investment and commercial banking industries.

Even if the operatives running the Clinton outside money groups decided to raise money following a philosophy of gender equity more in line with Clinton’s advocacy for women, it’s unclear to whom they’d go asking. Outside spending groups like super PACs are notoriously funded by, well, oldwhitemen. What’s more, much of the money from women to the Clinton super PACs came from wives of well-known and prolific donors like Cheryl Saban, wife of Haim Saban, one of the largest outside group donors this cycle.

For now, though, Clinton can still claim a figure that beats all other candidates: 43 percent of all money donated to support her, whether given to her campaign or the super PACs supporting her, came from women.

Will joined the Center in May 2015 as the money-in-politics reporter for OpenSecrets.org. Previously, he spent two years as an investigative reporter for Hearst Newspapers in the company's Washington, D.C. bureau, investigating members of Congress for the Houston Chronicle, the San Antonio Express-News and other Hearst newspapers. He graduated in 2013 from the University of Alabama with a degree in international relations and was the editor-in-chief of The Crimson White, UA's student newspaper.

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